of those who find themselves outside of --& bitter towards-- the Church.

I'm a strong believer that neither Jesus nor his Church needs defending. Faithfully emulating Christ in & of itself is the only real "defense" that his church needs.

Too many Mormons have identified w "the Church" in a tribal & corporate way — that ultimately is a lie, imo.

While church affiliation for many of us is of course at the basis of our BYU fandom, let's not make our BYU fandom an extension of our Mormon tribalism — which itself is often wrong & off the mark of the Christianity that we've been called to.

As the BoM teaches, faithfulness & righteousness is manifest in the building up of strong peoples — into families & tribes. But if the faith becomes centered on the family & tribe they will become proud & corrupt — & eventually lose their faith. And ultimately lose their tribe as well.

The Nephites vitally needed — & yet were ultimately destroyed by — the Lamanites. (& I'm NOT in any way insinuating by this that I think the yewts need to be in the Big12 w us. I definitely don't. But I would try to get every positive & hopeful thing out of it, if it were to come to that. Like everything else in BYU sports, how I act & feel as a fan definitely makes a difference.)